Kerry, Feingold Unite in Iraq Withdrawal Call

Posted on Jun 20, 2006

The two senators appealed to the Senate—and to 3 million other Americans via e-mail—to back their call to withdraw combat troops from Iraq “by a hard and fast deadline.”

Sens. Jack Reed and Carl Levin supported the call—unlike many Democrats and most Republicans.

AP:

Two potential 2008 presidential candidates appealed Tuesday for the Senate to support their call to withdraw U.S. combat troops from Iraq “by a hard and fast deadline,” a position putting them at odds with most of their fellow Democrats.

“Our country desperately needs a new vision for strengthening our national security, and it starts by redeploying U.S. forces out of Iraq,” Sens. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Russ Feingold of Wisconsin wrote in an e-mail sent to 3 million people nationwide.

“It’s time for every member of the Senate to send an important message that we must change course,” the senators wrote, imploring recipients to “take a stand against the senseless ‘stay the course’ Bush policy” and tell their senators to vote with the two Democrats.

In what promises to be a highly partisan election-year showdown Wednesday, the GOP-controlled Senate plans to take up the proposal by Kerry and Feingold that would require the Bush administration to withdraw all combat troops from Iraq by July 1, 2007. Redeployment would begin immediately, under the proposal.